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Red Bulls at Los Angeles Galaxy: Running Commentary

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Good evening folks. Apologies for the late start to the running commentary. Let’s get it started.

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FINAL- The Red Bulls move to 3-1-2 on the season, with a four-match unbeaten streak heading into next week’s meeting with Kansas City.

That’s all for tonight. Share your thoughts on the match in the comments section below. Thanks for following along here and have a good night and Happy Mother’s Day tomorrow.

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FINAL- Red Bulls 2, Galaxy 1. What a win by the Red Bulls, playing without central midfielders Claudio Reyna and Seth Stammler. They defended extremely well, limited Beckham and Donovan and made the most of the few chances that did come.

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94th minute- Final seconds for LA here.

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93rd minute- The Galaxy is struggling to find a good chance in these final seconds despite plenty of possession.

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91st minute- Silly foul by Altidore, giving LA another free kick from long range. Kick is cleared away by Angel.

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89th minute- Galaxy with a very dangerous free kick from the right flank. Cleared out of danger by the Red Bulls.

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88th minute- Wow, what a crafty play by Beckham. Van Den Bergh goes to kick a ball away from behind Beckham and Beckham grabs his leg and brings them both to ground, drawing a free kick.

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87th minute- A great piece of defending by Sassano on Beckham.

And nice job by Steve Cangielosi to try and jinx the Red Bulls with the stat that the Red Bulls are the only team in MLS not to allow a goal in the final 15 minutes of a match.

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86th minute- The Galaxy has brought in a forward named Bryan Jordan. if there were every a player who merited the "Who Are Ya" chant, Jordan is that player.

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84th minute- Conway with a great stop on Randolph, showing some bravery to run out and make himself big on that stop. A great night by Conway tonight.

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83rd minute- Great work by Richards tonight, making the most of his first extended action of the year.

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82nd minute- Wolyniec in for Richards.

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81st minute- What we are seeing now is the Angel-Altidore-Richards attacking trio that Juan Carlos Osorio has been desperate to put on the field together. That trio looks pretty good working together.

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81st minute- Conway with a save on a Randolph shot.

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80th minute- What a nice pass by Richards on the goal, who looks very comfortable on the left flank, which is a move I have been saying would wind up happening.

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79th minute- GOAL RED BULLS. Juan Pablo Angel WITH the GO-AHEAD GOAL. Great pass by Dane Richards and Angel makes a great run, touch and finish. Red Bulls 2, Galaxy 1.

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77th minute- GOAL GALAXY. Alan Gordon with the equalizer on what started out as a harmless play from the left flank. Nice turn and shot by Gordon. Parke was a bit too lax on that one. Galaxy 1, Red Bulls 1.

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76th minute- The Red Bulls are in the same formation they used to such great effect against Toronto last week. Keeping things compact in central midfield.

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75th minute- Galaxy gets a free kick after Goldthwaite fouls Donovan and gets a yellow card.

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74th minute- Looks like Dane Richards has slid into the left forward role in what is basically a 4-3-3 with Angel up top and Altidore as a right forward.

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73rd minute- ANGEL shot saved by Cronin. A great look and good shot on goal by Angel. Nice save.

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72nd minute- Bad corner by Beckham. His free kicks and corner do tend to worsen late in tough matches. Fatigue plays its part.

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70th minute- Great slide tackle by Jeff Parke to stop Donovan from doing something from close range. LA corner.

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69th minute- The game is getting VERY physical right now. I do have to say that Mendes looks VERY uncomfortable in open space. He can break things up but when he has to defend in the open field he will have problems.

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67th minute- That has to be a yellow card on Beckham. What is the beef between Beckham and Van Den Bergh? This is an interesting subplot.

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67th minute- Very nice idea by Luke Sassano on an attempted through ball to Angel.

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66th minute- Where’s Mike Magee?

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64th minute- Wow, Beckham in a great position with a clear look from the right flank, but his cross is way off. The Red Bulls dodged one there.

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63rd minute- Looks like Carlos Mendes is in a defensive midfield role, with Van Den Bergh sliding out wide.

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61st minute- Angel with a decent look but can’t get good enough shot on Cronin with his weaker left foot.

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59th minute- Wow, Beckham gets a way with a cheeky moment, hitting Goldthwaite in the head with the ball. Dangerous free kick for LA. but Conway has a good punch to clear it.

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58th minute- Mendes in for Borman

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57th minute- If Carlos Mendes is coming into this game I think you’ll see Freeman pushed into the midfield.

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56th minute- One Red Bulls player who can hold the ball is Van Den Bergh, but he’s too busy defending Beckham to do that.

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55th minute- The Red Bulls need somebody who can keep the ball and none of the midfielders are showing an ability to do that.

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50th minute- Good no-call by the ref on that alleged foul on Vanney. No way that’s a penalty.

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49th minute- It’s clear that the Red Bulls are content with letting Franchino and McDonald have as much of the ball as they want.

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48th minute- Galaxy corner kick.

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47th minute- No subs for either team.

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46th minute- And we’re back.

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HALFTIME- So what adjustments should we expect from the Galaxy? Look for Beckham to attack more from the flanks, rather than central, where the Red Bulls have done well to get in his way. Also, Donovan is the one player who can truly trouble Red Bulls defenders so look for him to drop back to get more of the ball.

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HALFTIME- Just saw the replay of Borman’s goal celebration. You have to give him credit for still trying to pull off the Cuauhtemoc Blanco celebration AFTER the failed cartwheel.

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HALFTIME- Did anyone else see Abel Xavier warming up? Ruud Gullit is a smart man and I can’t imagine he’ll let Xavier anywhere near the field tonight (that sound you hear is Jozy Altidore and Juan Pablo Angel shedding a tear).

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HALFTIME- Who is asking these David Beckham questions? Zzzzzzzzzzzzz.

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HALFTIME- Some good work by David Beckham, Mike Magee and Luke Sassano in central midfield and really the whole team has done well. It helps that the Galaxy seems incapable of high-pressure defending anywhere on the field.

I think Osorio will have to consider sitting Dane Richards in the second half, moving Hunter Freeman to right mid and bringing in Chris Leitch at right back.

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HALFTIME- Red Bulls 1, Galaxy 0. I have to say that while this Red Bulls lineup is a make-shift group, it is certainly playing the right team. LA’s central midfield is pretty weak after Beckham and Juan Carlos Osorio has done a good job of making stopping Beckham the priority. Unless someone else on LA steps up in the attack, the Red Bulls will be content to shadow Beckham and Donovan all night.

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45th minute- Look at Jeff Parke dribbling through the middle of the field like Franz Beckenbauer (okay, maybe not).

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45th minute- Some great team defending by the Red Bulls so far and the Galaxy hasn’t created much so far.

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44th minute- Gordon with a free header off a Beckham corner. The Red Bulls need to defend better on those plays because most players would bury that chance.

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43rd minute- Hunter Freeman has had a pretty good game tonight (except for that unforced turnover in the middle of the field that led to an LA corner.)

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40th minute- Jon Conway didn’t know much about that Beckham free kick and the Red Bulls are lucky it didn’t find an LA player in the area.

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40th minute- Van Den Bergh gets a yellow card for a foul on David Beckham. I would love to see that replay.

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38th minute- The ugly tackles by the Galaxy are getting out of hand. Another yellow, this one for Mike Randolph for a hack on Borman.

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36th minute- And there’s Goldthwaite with great defense on Donovan.

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35th minute- The Red Bulls get lucky that the Galaxy can’t convert a stolen pass into a goal.

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34th minute- You could argue that the Red Bulls defense is well-suited to stop the Galaxy attack because Jeff Parke and Kevin Goldthwaite are so good in the air and well-suited to stop the Galaxy’s steady stream of crosses.

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33rd minute- One thing is clear about the LA defense. It gives up way too much space and I can’t imagine how Angel and Altidore won’t combine for a goal tonight. LA makes Toronto FC’s defense look like Manchester United’s by comparison.

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32nd minute- The Galaxy look a bit lost in the attack and I have to say I’m impressed with what the Red Bulls central midfield has been able to do tonight.

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30th minute- Richards is definitely laboring and looks a step slow out there, but the Red Bulls don’t really have other options so he’ll have to do, at least for the first half.

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28th minute- I can’t help but wonder how long Dane Richards will last considering the abuse he’s taking tonight.

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26th minute- Galaxy with a corner kick. These are dangerous for LA, with Donovan taking. Nice punched away by Jon Conway.

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23rd minute– Sean Franklin with an ugly foul on Juan Pablo Angel and gets a yellow card for his trouble.

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22nd minute– What a great turn and shoot by Altidore to set that goal up.

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21st minute- GOAL RED BULLS. Danleigh Borman finishes off a rebound after Altidore turned on one in the area and had his shot saved by Cronin. Great finish by the rookie.

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19th minute- Interesting no-call on what looked like a foul on Altidore in the penalty area. I think the ref missed one there.

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18th minute- Good work from the Red Bulls defense so far in this one. LA hasn’t done much.

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17th minute– Wow, great play by Dane Richards, who puts a turnover in Jozy Altidore’s path but Altidore couldn’t put a shot on goal.

Comments

  1. Hey Jacob, I don’t see you praising DANE RICHARDS for setting up the goal by Angel. But then again your one of the pathetic ones that wants to kill him when he only had a match & 38 minutes in Toronto & in LA when he came back from his knee injury.

    At least Borman & Richards has more skill than that guy Randolph will ever have. Deal with it, Danleigh Borman & Dane Richards are apart of the future of this club that will do damage in this league whether you like it or not.

    Reply
  2. To me, the most impressive thing about this game was the fact that all 25 red bulls fans made the trip out to Carson. Bravo!

    Reply
  3. this game was well refereed, best i’ve seen in any mls game i can remember.

    there wasnt really any preferential treatment.

    donovan had a few outside shots, but opted to try to dribble through the box looking for the foul. red bull defense did well to avoid that.

    Reply
  4. Anyone who feels there is a great conspiracy is crazy.

    BTW I think there should be, I mean did you ever watch Jordan play? He would get a foul called almost every time he was touched. That caused people to lay off and there was room for the magic. If MLS has half a brain, they will give Beckham this type of benefit. It is too important to the league to have him do well. For example, Gordon’s first goal was barely offsides, no one would have been complaining if it was ruled a goal.

    Also, If there was the galaxy bias, why no penalty for Vanney in the second half. It was clearly a foul, I agree it probably didn’t deserve a penalty, but if there were a conspiracy it would have been.

    Reply
  5. Nice win. Like true top shelf strikers JPA and Altidore looked at time uninterested or simply not ready to play. But when given an opportunity, bang…goal.

    Also liked Sassano. Every time he got the ball he put it into play to one of his teammates. We may have a replacemet for Rayna in the wings.

    Lastly, while I am a big fan of Coach Arena, Osorio seems to be getting even more out of the same team Arena left. An applause for Coach Osorio.

    Reply
  6. kpugs,

    My sincere apologies for offending, and particularly you because i always enjoy your posts.

    Strangely enough, i too have an autistic cousin and have done work in mental health care settings.

    This was not meant to be derogatory.

    “Autism is a brain development disorder that impairs social interaction and communication, and causes restricted and repetitive behavior.”

    What I was trying to say was that Freeman doesn’t seem to communicate well with the rest of the team (Parke and Richards in particular) and that he strangely insisted to play long balls directly to the Galaxy center back.

    This was not some off-hand, off-the cuff comment, as I think you assumed it was. And it was certainly not intended to poke fun at your cousin, nor anyone else.

    As far as personal integrity and cowardice with regards to logging into the site…are you serious?

    I’ll email you directly now to continue the conversation, and would be happy to meet up, provided your offer is not some veiled threat, in which case, so be it…

    Best,

    Jason

    Reply
  7. Well Galaxians ,first of all Backham should be red cardes around 65-70th minute ..the way MLS makes refs play for backham is just unbeliveble .Well what u expect from ref that run away from prosecution in Poland ( selling games),and if your team was that great you would get at least 10 points in 7 games ….And compering Randolph to Richards …you must be kiding me…meybe when dane is like 60% ..only similarities those to players have is that they Black and they names start with R….and one more thing God I hate the flopers like Donovan..he isnt that great never made in Europe

    Reply
  8. Ok Ives- I’ve got to give it to you, tonight’s game shows your ranking of NYRB in the last power rankings was spot on. I didn’t see it WITH Reyna and Stammler in the middle, but tonight they proved their quality WITHOUT their preferred central pairing… very impressive win on the road.

    Reply
  9. kpugs… I am a Red Bulls fan… and I honestly think Alex Prus did a decent job and was quite fair… Gordon’s goal was called offside, Becks got a yellow… I am not saying he didn’t get a few calls wrong but he is so much better than Abbe, Marrufo and Hall!

    Reply
  10. Which of the following LandyCakes moments was the funniest?

    1) His flopping around trying to get a PK once he realized he was getting past the Metro D?

    2) His injury Gordon after Gordon’s goal with his home-erotic chest/shoulder bump?

    3) The look on his face when JPA scored a minute later.

    Landycakes cracks me up. Such a whiny cissy.

    Reply
  11. 4now, whoever you are, obviously without the integrity to log into the site. Lay off the autistic, or any other similar comments that specifically target groups of people. “Idiots” is one thing. But I have a cousin who is autistic, that I love, and he is infinitely smarter than any other human I know. If you are too much of a coward to log into the site and give me an avenue to email you, stop saying it. Because I’d love to talk to you about it face to face if you’d like.

    Reply
  12. I can’t wait to see what the fan post says about this. After an entire season plus the few games this season, it is so BLATANTLY EFFING OBVIOUS that the refs are doing all they can to help the Galaxy win.

    Not only that–Donovan has ALWAYS been an MLS primadonna. The fact that this has now escalated to screaming at refs and getting in the faces of other players is ridiculous.

    It is so plain to any half-assed eye that the league is trying so hard to lay down a nice red carpet for L.A. to the cup.

    What’s awesome about it? That would be how terrible the team is. That’s what’s awesome.

    Ay L.A. Galaxy fan who has complaints, email me. EVERY single game you play is refereed in your favor. I absolutely dare you to prove me otherwise. The Galaxy are a step back in soccer in this country. A terrible team being advanced through conspiracy…and no, I’m not normally a conspiracy theorist. It only takes watching a few games to realize it’s fact.

    And what did I forget? Oh yeah, L.A. fans, Donovan DIVING now? REPEATEDLY? I can’t believe a guy who plays so well for the national team now resorts to diving…then after a blatant dive, complaining. He finally realized he’s protected by the league. Personally, I would be completely humiliated as a fan if I watched my best playter pathetically dive like that in desperation to score.

    Then you have Beckham who think’s he’s the ref. He can hack down anyone he wants, peg Goldthwaite with the ball in the head, etc. I’d be EMBARRASSED to support a team that gets preferential treatment. It’s pathetic. Congrats you idiots.

    Reply
  13. Some notes:

    SASSANO is a completely different player in the DCM role, and much more effective.

    FREEMAN has the technical skill but is basically autistic when it comes to tactics.

    PARKE is the opposite of Freeman, and a better option.

    CONWAY is the most underrated GK in the league.

    RICHARDS is class at this level.

    BORMAN needs to calm down.

    MAGEE is a second team option. But we need a real ACM.

    Long live VDB and not bad GOLDY.

    ANGEL and ALTIDORE shouldn’t be in this league.

    MENDES is a classy guy.

    Reply
  14. You have to love the fact that Beckhham grabs VDB’s leg and falls onto him getting a foul called on VDB.

    Hilarious.

    I would’ve loved to see some fouls called on the Galaxy’s hacking tonight.

    Reply
  15. Conway looks very assured out there this season. Apart from a couple of crappy kicks, he had a flawless game.

    Great win all around, but special praise for Conway, Parke, JPA and VDB for getting up Becks’ nose.

    Reply
  16. another highly entertaining Galaxy game

    and seriously, what’s the deal with Beckham/VDB? he was sizing Becks up for a nice elbow to the face early in the second half

    Reply
  17. Gutsy effort by the Bulls… A road win is like gold! Thanks Ives for picking the Gals to win 2-1… you know not to pick the BUlls to win… Gracias!

    Reply

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